What I like is of course the new start screen, bluetooth share and the new theme colors. But the best new feature for me is actually the Xbox Live Games that have now been enabled for my country (Romania).
What I like less is that I feel the phone has become a little laggy especially in the start screen. Before the update I have almost never asked myself if my touch has been registered because the screen would react immediatly to any input from me. After the update it seems to be less responsive, there is a sizeable delay from a tile press to the actual program launch and I found myself several times thinking that my touch is not registered.

I have to agree with you. I am running 7.8 on my ATT L900. while swiping the start screen up or down, or swiping over to get to the app list. No issues. But it seem to lag a bit when tapping on icons. Not sure if there is actually a difference, but any mail icon seems to take a second before launching the inbox, atleast more than any other icon.

no really what I am noticing is that they have added an extra animation step where it shows your tap was confirmed.registered with a little depression of the tile, then it animates just as fast as before. When swiping between the apps list and the start screen there seems to be a rendering order of how the tiles are drawn in. It is all weird and I wish you could at least turn off the tap confirmation.

I thought about the same thing, but from what I can remember there is some kind of "tap animation" in wp7.5 as well. Could be wrong. And also this kind of animation is not even visible for small tiles (my thumb covers it all up). Maybe that's why I get the impression it is slower.

There are also some occasional hiccups while using the keyboard that were not there before.

I concur. I was wondering why the update would make things slower but to say the least, I am a bit disheartened. Reminds me of the android days when the phone would get slower over time and with any new update.

I thought about the same thing, but from what I can remember there is some kind of "tap animation" in wp7.5 as well. Could be wrong. And also this kind of animation is not even visible for small tiles (my thumb covers it all up). Maybe that's why I get the impression it is slower.

There are also some occasional hiccups while using the keyboard that were not there before.

I'm still on 7.5 build 8779 and can say that when you tap a tile it appears to press in like a button for an instant, then the tiles do a page turn sort of thing, then the app opens. It all happens quickly.

A bit more lag may be the trade off. My hope was that they were taking so much time that they actually would have it perfect when they released it. But any big "after market" upgrade will change your devices perfromance.

When the operation was as smooth as WP 7.5 was, you most likely have nowhere to go but down. The only question:

A bit more lag may be the trade off. My hope was that they were taking so much time that they actually would have it perfect when they released it. But any big "after market" upgrade will change your devices perfromance.

When the operation was as smooth as WP 7.5 was, you most likely have nowhere to go but down. The only question:

Is the 7.8 update worth a little lag?

It's noticeably slower but not by enough for it to bother me more than a miniscule amount. This is on a 900 though; I'm not sure if lower end phones like the 610 would be affected more so than mine. But I think it's worth it since I can fit so much more on my screen. Plus I'm enjoying the Bing wallpapers.

I'm still on 7.5 build 8779 and can say that when you tap a tile it appears to press in like a button for an instant, then the tiles do a page turn sort of thing, then the app opens. It all happens quickly.

hmm that's basically what it does in 7.8. All tile sizes. Than maybe it really is loading slower. What have they done? If that's a purely cosmetic update I wouldn't expect this.

i say it varies, at times the phone seems snapper and sometimes it seems to lag with the animations as others describe. Even battery dies fast sometimes and then other times it slower. Idk it was still worth it to upgrade i used the cab method so that must be the issue im sure a official one would work alot better.

Verizon Trophy here. I'm running a custom ROM based on 7.8 and I noticed the lag when tapping on a tile as well. I thought it was just an issue with the ROM I'm using at first. I guess it's kind of good to know that other are seeing the same thing. I say "kind of" because I doubt that there will ever be another update that addresses this. I guess I'll get used to it eventually.

I did the upgrade on LG-E900 ... it says update completed .. but I do not see any changes on the home screen. it is still the same old screen, two columns of tiles jut gotten a little bit bigger! no blue tooth changes, nothing ... Am I missing something? The only change I see is the new theme colors!
OS Version 7.10.8858.136.. Model LG LG-900

I did the upgrade on LG-E900 ... it says update completed .. but I do not see any changes on the home screen. it is still the same old screen, two columns of tiles jut gotten a little bit bigger! no blue tooth changes, nothing ... Am I missing something? The only change I see is the new theme colors!
OS Version 7.10.8858.136.. Model LG LG-900

If you tap and hold on a tile, you'll see a little arrow icon that lets you resize the tile. Other than that, not much changed.

never noticed it, my big fingers covered the lower corner!! I wish they published some release notes on the new features ... mega thanks. I'll keep searching for other tips and hints, but I'm relaxed now ... on the performance front, all is good, no negative impact at all... so far!

Windows Phone 7.8 brings only aesthetics changes but also affect badly the responsiveness of the phone. I was able to hit Mail live tile then Messages and have both apps load showing how slow this update makes your phone. I hope Microsoft address this problem since WPC reported that there are rumors of 7.8+ updates to come, at least Nokia should fix this.

I have a Lumia 900 and I haven't noticed any change in performance. If anything, it feels a little zippier.
FWIW, I really like this little update. Much nicer to be able to put a few more apps directly on the home screen.

no really what I am noticing is that they have added an extra animation step where it shows your tap was confirmed.registered with a little depression of the tile,

That was also there before. You just didn't notice it because the app or part of os (contacts, mail, messages etc) would open into the opening-animation instantly. I used to keep my finger on the tile without letting go to see if it animates into different angles, and it did/does. It's animated in 3d, that's also why I didn't understand the whole "it's fluid because its just 2d" bullsht, because it's just as 3d as android, just without the painted bubbly-ness and gradients on the textures/objects, which must have made all the idiots think that their OS are 3D objects lol

Anyway, yes, it has become slower to open anything. Before I would just click on the phone-apps and they would open instantly (marketplace, contacts, texts, call list etc..) but now it takes some time, i click it and can wait and watch it before it begins to open it. Sometimes i think it hasn't registered and i tap again even though it already has, sometimes it registers accidental input and i dont realize it until i am already somewhere else on the start screen just to suddenly be interrupted in my attempt to open what i really wanted to open by the app that i accidentally touched 2 seconds ago...it's bs and a i am wondering if they may have made it deliberately just so people would feel their phones are becoming old/slow/obsolete (just like it was with computers a few years ago) to tempt them to feel they have to buy a new one, especially after they have "tasted blood" with the new start screen, which really looks better than the old one.

Start screen scrolling is fine, but launching an app from it has degraded severely. After tapping a tile, it can take 2 ~ 4 seconds before it'll actually jump into the app now. Quite concerning. Gen1 device.

I'm having the same problem, lumia 710 here. It's definitely not the animation. The first time I opened the games hub, it took about 2 seconds. The second and third times were faster. I see similar behavior from other apps too.

If the animation was the problem, it would have taken the same time, every time.